


B is for Battle Ready

by sg_wonderland



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Alphabet Soup Challenge, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-05
Updated: 2014-11-05
Packaged: 2018-02-24 05:10:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2569349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sg_wonderland/pseuds/sg_wonderland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Catherine Langford and Janet Fraiser, an unlikely friendship</p>
            </blockquote>





	B is for Battle Ready

Be is for Battle Ready

 

“General Hammond, I have to repeat that I firmly believe this is a mistake.” Dr. Janet Fraiser jammed her hands in her lab coat, clearly frustrated.

“Dr. Langford passed her physical?” General Hammond flipped through the file on his desk.

“Yes, sir, she did. However, her age notwithstanding, SG-1 could be gating into a hostile environment. Dr. Langford is…”

“An old broad?” They both turned to face the woman climbing the stairs and coming into the briefing room. “I appreciate your concern, Dr. Fraiser. But my mind’s made up. I am going to the planet. I have to go.”

“I would be lax in my duties at a doctor if I didn’t object…”

“I realize you have no idea how healthy I am, you just have my word for the fact that I’m tough as boot leather. Very old boot leather.” Her dark eyes gleamed mischievously.

“Catherine!” Daniel protested behind her. “You’re not old!”

Catherine patted his arm. “Oh, Daniel, only someone as naïve as you would say that. I am old.” She turned back to face Dr. Fraiser. “Please try to understand. Ernest could be out there. I have to see for myself, with my own eyes, what happened to him. Besides, I suspect this is my only shot of going through the gate. I can’t see General Hammond agreeing to let me join an SG team.”

Frustrated, Fraiser curtly asked for permission to return to the infirmary.

*

Dr. Fraiser had to admit, reluctantly, that Catherine Langford had suffered no ill effects of her trip through the Stargate. No physical effects, anyway. However, the older woman was currently sitting on a gurney looking down at the hands she was constantly twisting.

Reaching out, the doctor stilled those restless hands. “I believe Dr. Littlefield will be fine, in time. He needs to gain some weight and I can’t even begin to imagine how to introduce him to this world…”

“When can he go home?” 

“Home?” 

“I won’t have him staying here any longer than necessary,” Catherine snapped. “When the Air Force releases him, I’m taking him home with me.”

“That…medically, I’d like to keep him at least a week. As to when he can leave…”

Surprisingly, Catherine smiled. “Young lady, you don’t have to tell me anything about the Air Force; I’ve been battering against this wall longer than you’ve been alive.” Her voice softened. “He should be able to see the sky and smell the grass and know that there’s a whole world out there.”

Fraiser smiled back at her. “Yes, he deserves that much.”

“I have to…there are so many things I need to see to. He…he didn’t recognize me at first.”

Dr. Fraiser clutched the file to her chest. “As far as we know, he hasn’t seen or spoken to another human being in fifty years. He’s holding up remarkably well, given the circumstances.”

Catherine ran a trembling hand through her hair. “This morning, I woke up, thinking it was going to be an ordinary day and I ended up on another planet. This has been…Ernest is back from the dead and all I can think about is whether my hair looks alright.”

The two women shared a smile before Catherine hopped down from the gurney. “Dr. Fraiser, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got an Air Force to bully.”

Fraiser wasn’t about to bet against the white-haired steamroller who sailed purposefully from the infirmary. She handed off the file in her hands and went to check on Dr. Littlefield.

*

Catherine was standing at the bottom of the stairs, hands worrying her necklace when Janet appeared. “Relax, Dr. Langford, he’s fine. He won’t even need stitches.”

“Thank heavens! When I saw the blood, I just…”

Janet led the older woman into the sitting room. “Head wounds always bleed profusely.”

“I’m sorry for calling you at home, Dr. Fraiser, but I didn’t know what to do. And I knew I’d never get him to the emergency room.” She looked up as the maid wheeled in a gleaming cart. “Thank you, Martha.”

“Shall I pour?” Janet chose not to mention the trembling hands, She fussed over the tea, the scones, commented on the tea service, giving Catherine time to catch her breath.

“This was my grandmother’s service.”

“It’s beautiful. I’m glad you’re not afraid to use it.”

The twinkle was returning to Catherine’s eye. “If there’s anyone who should appreciate old things still being useful, it would be me.”

 

*

“Janet. Come in, my, it’s cold out there!” Catherine kissed her cheek as she handed the heavy wool coat to Martha. “I’ve a fire in the sitting room.”

“Oh, that’s lovely!” Janet warmed her hands before she sank onto the sofa and accepted a cup.

“Would you like a stiffener?” Catherine’s hand hovered over the crystal decanter.

“Oh, no, thanks. I’ve got to pick up Cassie in an hour.”

“And where is your young lady this afternoon?”

“Colonel O’Neill is afraid that Dr. Jackson is filling her head with nonsense so he’s taken her to a hockey game.”

Catherine laughed. “What type of nonsense does he think Daniel is teaching her?”

“Head in the clouds stuff, I think is how the colonel described it. Not enough ‘useful skills’, in his opinion.”

“I shudder to think what Colonel O’Neill deems useful.”

*

 

Catherine took one look at Janet’s frozen expression before pouring a stiff dollop of whiskey in the teacup before handing it over. “I don’t have to tell you that Daniel knows you were only doing what you thought best.”

“As long as I live, I am never going to forget him crying, begging me to help him. And I know he’s never going to forget that I didn’t help him.”

There was nothing Catherine could do but nod her head and listen. 

*

 

“So General Hammond put a reprimand in your file? I suppose he had no other choice.”

“I guess holding a gun on an alien prisoner is against some sort of regulation.”

Catherine had to smile at the image of the petite doctor holding a very big gun. “I can’t imagine a mother who wouldn’t do everything to save her child.” She couldn’t help but think about the children who were only ever a dream and a wish.

*

Martha met her at the door, silently took Catherine’s coat and hat. “Shall I bring you anything else, ma’am?”

“No, thank you, Martha.” She watched as her employer walked slowly into the sitting room.

With a long sigh, Catherine poured tea for one.


End file.
